


i forgive you.

by speedohiko



Series: speaking in flowers [1]
Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Love Story, Minor Swearing, Self-Insert, So much angst, character death doesn't happen until way later, flower shop, no i am not sorry, what are tags, you will probably cry at the end of this
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-02-19
Updated: 2015-12-27
Packaged: 2018-03-13 17:33:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,680
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3390224
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/speedohiko/pseuds/speedohiko
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which James Buchanan Barnes- the Winter Soldier- meets a girl in a flower shop, and somehow he falls in love. And somehow, she knows that it can't have a good ending.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. blue salvia

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Outcast](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=Outcast).

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The first meeting.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It begins.
> 
> No, really, oh my god. I can't believe I'm writing this. This is going to be some sort of adventure AU for one of my friends who has an obsession with Bucky Barnes. She is the "you" in this story, but eh. I don't really know how long this is going to end up (or how terrible /shot) so that's something. I have a ton of ficlet ideas for it so like. it's accidentally turning into a series oops. Rating will probably be updated as I write since I don't really have any idea how explicit/mature this is going to be as of yet, it's not quite that far in planning. T-rated is a safe bet, but I don't know yet orz
> 
> Also, apologies for the weird perspective-- Outcast likes second person stories, and I just don't do well with them, lmao,,,, Other things not related to this story will likely be in first or third, just because that's how I write.
> 
> I think that's everything!! sorry for such a long note uwu they'll be much shorter from now on,,, okay, please enjoy or smth!!

You look up from your phone as the door opens, signaling a customer. A tall man walks in, thin brown hair framing his face and... was that a _metal arm?_ You dismiss the idea, deeming it too stupid to actually be the case.

"Um, good afternoon! How can I help you?"

The man looks over at you, blinking slowly. You swallow nervously, because while this strange man is _incredibly attractive_ , he is also _incredibly intimidating._ Most of the people that visited the shop were old ladies for the church or stupid guys who'd angered their girlfriends. Tall, muscular men that might have a metal arm? Definitely a first for this old place. He doesn't reply, but walks over to a display of flowers.

"What are these?"

His voice is deep and husky; it's a sound that was really easy to listen to. You stood up from behind the counter, making your way over to where he was standing.

"These are blue salvia," you tell him. "In flower languages, they're usually used to say something like 'I think of you'."

He nods, still studying the display. You wait a few moments before heading back to the counter, assuming he didn't need anything more. From your placement in the room, you can see everything in the shop, so it's very easy to watch him as he looks at other flower arrangements.

"Are you looking for something in particular?" You call out, wondering what he was doing in the shop at all. You didn't really think he was a flower enthusiast or someone who would keep flowers in his house, so his presence was strange and unnerving. "What do you need the flowers for?"

The man looked at you again, this time in front of a display with daisies and violets. _Why doesn't he speak?_ you wonder, frowning slightly. It was confusing and mildly terrifying how silently he moved, let alone his lack of interaction with you. Desperate for any kind of conversation, you introduce yourself, hoping he might share his name, something. He blinks at you- once, twice, three times- before turning away again.

"Just killing time." he finally says, much to your relief. Any words were a blessing at this point. You still wondered what his name was, because calling him "the man" and "he" inside your head was getting old very fast. He didn't say anything more, and left as quickly as he'd come.

"That's it?" you call out to the empty shop. "No purchases or even a name? _Jackass!"_

You wait out the rest of your shift somewhat moodily, scrolling through Facebook silently during the long spaces between customers. You greet your friend Anais as she comes in to take over for the closing shift at six o'clock, grateful that the day was finally over.

"Oh, I added new playlists to the store's computer yesterday," Anais chatters as you gather your stuff and clock out. "I don't know if you noticed or anything, they probably played today. Oh well. Was your shift interesting? Any weirdos I should be on the lookout for?"

"It was relatively normal, I guess," you reply, shouldering your bag. "Oh, well, there was this total asshole who was here for like twenty minutes and didn't buy anything at all. He didn't even like, talk, either. Totally silent and intimidating and it was really annoying. He didn't even say his name before leaving."

"What did he look like? I'll keep an eye out and see if I can get a name from him."

"He was pretty tall- almost 6 feet tall, I think. He had brown hair that was thin and like, chin-length... He had a muscular build, blue eyes... Oh, and he may have had a metal arm? It was kind of hard to tell-"

 _"A metal arm?!"_ Anais interrupts you, slamming her hands down on the counter. "That's- that's something you mention immediately! You said that so casually- I can't believe-"

You look at her quizzically. "It's not that big of a deal, Anais- just an advanced prosthetic, probably." You look down at your watch, noticing that it was already 6:15. You thought about the audition packet waiting for you at your apartment, sighing internally. You wanted to be an actress, but the forms to get on the list to even try out? They were a special kind of hell. "Anyway, I gotta go complete a packet, so I'll catch you later. But seriously- call me if you get his name, I want to talk so much shit."

"You bet," Anais replied, pulling an apron over her head. "Later!"

You leave the shop, sighing as you made your way down three blocks to your apartment building. You looked at the setting sun, wishing you had a different shift so you could enjoy the sun- or rather, tan. You disliked how pale your complexion had gotten after high school, missing the days when you could sit in your backyard until the sun went down and gain color.

You walked into your building, making your way to the fifth floor where you lived. It was quiet, which wasn't unusual for the time of day, but you suddenly wished for a little noise to distract you from your thoughts of a stupidly attractive man at work whose name _you didn't even know_. You frowned as you opened your apartment, recalling his face and not being able to get rid of the image.

You sit at the kitchen counter with the audition packet, carefully filling it out, trying to do it perfectly. If you could do that, you thought it might help your chances. It wasn't a certainty, but it couldn't hurt. After reading several pages of twelve-point Times New Roman or whatever font it was, you drop the pen and walk from the counter.

"Can't do anymore tonight- nope, I'm done."

You look at the time- 9:15. You briefly wonder how it got to be so late that quickly, since the packet hadn't seemed that long when you picked it up initially. You shrug and start getting ready for bed, deciding to call it a night earlier than usual. A certain metal-armed man _might_ have had something to do with that, but you refuse to acknowledge that as you lay down. You begin to drift off into sleep, thoughts of him finally beginning to fade.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i have a [tumblr](speedohiko.tumblr.com)
> 
> also, this is way shorter than it looked on mobile and how do end chapters holy shIT


	2. lemon geranium

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A second meeting.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lemon geranium is a plant sometimes said to mean _unexpected meeting._

Procrastinating so long on the packet was one of the worst decisions you’d made this week. When you got up in the morning, you realized that the packet was due _today,_ and you still had a good half of it left to go. Shrieking slightly, you rushed to get ready for the day so you could try to finish it before work. You sat down to work on it, quickly skimming the pages of print for information that was new from the several other packets that you’ve filled out in the past. You got to the last few pages of information, groaning as you saw how many blanks there were.

A good twenty minutes later, you were signing your name, a painful cramp beginning to form in your hand. And that was the reason why you put it off so long; writing so much at once always hurt your hand like no other. You stretched as you stood up, realizing that you _probably_ could have filled it out last night, and gone straight to drop it off this morning, but what’s done is done. You still had a few hours before you had to clock in for your shift, so you gather your things and head out to drop off your completed packet.

The day is warm, a given for late summer. You vaguely wished you had a car to get to downtown faster than on public transit, but that was a long way from happening at this point. While the flower shop didn’t pay too badly and you worked most days out of the week, it just wasn’t enough to live on _and_ have a car payment. You brushed some hair from your eyes as you sat on the bus, looking out the window.You’d been lucky today, but frequently you were a few minutes behind the bus and missed it.

The ride was uneventful; you scrolled through Facebook a bit, but there hadn’t been many updates since your last time through your feed, so you quickly had returned to yesterday’s statuses. Sighing slightly, you looking back out the window, watching for your stop. Your mind wandered back to the metal-armed man from the day before, wondering where he was in the city today. Was he even still here? Maybe he was from out of town. This made sense to you, so you didn’t think you’d ever see him again, or learn his name. The latter was a shame- it felt a little impolite to refer to him as “that guy with a metal arm”, but there wasn’t much you could do about that.

You got off the bus, walking the few blocks that remained between you and the studio. It was getting warmer as you walked, which was something you appreciated. Cold weather did not agree with your skin, frequently drying it out to the point of cracking and bleeding despite any amount of moisturizing. You dropped off the packet and left, wondering what time the bus was going to come back to that stop. You didn't really want to wait for too long in the growing heat, and you needed to be back on the other side of town before work. You wandered back towards the stop, not taking any specific notice of people walking on either side of you until you felt something cold brush against your arm.

“Sorry,” you say, looking towards the source of contact. You double-take as you realize that the one you ran into was the same man from work yesterday. “Wait- it’s you! You! Oh my god, this is unbelievable!”

He didn’t reply, as you expected. He did stop, though, which was a little surprising. You stepped off to the side to let the other pedestrians pass you as you attempted to hold a conversation with this metal-armed man again. More of his sleeve was pushed up today, revealing that it was indeed past the wrist and not just on his hand. He doesn’t seem to notice you scrutinizing his arm, or he didn’t care. As you continued to study him, the poppy flower kept appearing in your head, which you couldn’t quite figure out.

“Alright, poppy,” you say, leaning against the cool brick of a building. “You were so rude yesterday- generally, when you go into a shop, you’re supposed to buy something. Otherwise it’s generally known as _loitering.”_

“Poppy?” is all he said, his face only shifting slightly. A few seconds later he says your name, which surprises you greatly. You hadn’t even been sure he was _listening,_ let alone digesting any information you’d given him. “Poppies are flowers. I’m not a flower. I have a name.”

“Oh yeah? What is it?” you reply acidically, your frustration clear in your voice. “I asked for it yesterday and you _decided_ to not give it to me, so from now on your name is Poppy until you tell me otherwise!”

He doesn’t reply again. You’re now incredibly irate and completely done with the conversation, so you turn and briskly try not to _stomp_ your way to the bus stop. You sit down on one of the benches and pull out your phone, searching the website with the bus schedule on it. You don’t want him to come over to you again, so you were very relieved when the bus was due to come in a few minutes. You look back to where Poppy had been, but he was gone. Shrugging your shoulders slightly, you lean back into the bench and set back onto Facebook to wait for the bus.

* * *

A few hours later, you were sitting inside of the flower shop, debating on whether or not to start to build a playlist to give yourself a break from Anais’s music tastes, which differed greatly from your own. The shop was empty, and there was only about twenty minutes to closing, so you didn’t anticipate any customers for the rest of that day. You went into your music and started a new playlist, only to be interrupted by the sound of someone bolting in.

“What the hell-? Anais, what are you doing?” You say as you look up towards the door. A frantic- looking Anais briskly walked up to you, her phone illuminated with what looked like a news article in her hand. "What do you want?"

"Did you hear?!" she demands, shoving her phone close to your face. "There was a huge incident yesterday, right before the end of your shift!"

You blink and pull your head back, taking the phone. You scroll a bit until you reach a picture, where you gasp in surprise.

"Anais- this- this is the guy I was talking about!"

"Huh?" Anais stares at you blankly, apparently not having any recollection of the previous day's conversation. "Was he a guy you found hot, or something...?"

"No- he was an asshole that wasted like 20 minutes in here, remember?" you tried to remind her, handing the phone back. "With the metal arm?"

"Wait, _really?"_ Anais looked at the pictures embedded into the article, squinting slightly. "Oh my god! Yeah, you can see it here a little!"

You nodded as Anais pointed to a shot of Poppy holding a very large gun, the silver on his hand very obvious.

"Oh, but yeah, I saw him again today. I was dropping off the audition packet, and ran into him on the way back," you tell her, going back to your own phone and scrolling through your songs to start compiling a playlist to have Anais add to the store's computer. "I questioned him, and found out that he does indeed have a name- he didn't give it to me, though, so I'm calling him Poppy."

"What? I read that he fled town, that's so weird!" Anais replied, sounding perplexed. "Wait, _Poppy?_ As in the flower that means _eternal sleep?"_

"Uh... Yeah, why?" you look over at her, your eyebrows partially raised. "Is there something wrong with that?"

Anais shifted, frowning slightly and looking away. You guessed that she was having difficulties articulating her thoughts, which wasn't uncommon for her. "Well, no, not inherently," she said slowly, then bit her lip as she continues to think. "It just feels a little... weird to me. What made you think of it?"

Your eyes widen slightly, as you weren't really expecting her to have so little to say after all that thought. "Uh, not sure, honestly. It was like... spur-of-the-moment, I guess?" You really _didn't_ know what caused you to call him that, but something about him reminded you of a poppy. You shrugged it off, determining that it was the fact you spent far too many hours of the week in a flower shop and telling people flower meanings that caused it. "I don't know, does it matter?"

"Not really," Anais said, brushing hair from her eyes. "Anyway, what are you doing?"

"Making a playlist," you reply, looking back down at your phone. "No offense, but your taste in music is actual shit."

You can almost hear her glare as you continue scrolling through. It wasn't hard to fluster and annoy Anais, and the results were usually hilarious. You glance at the time, relieved to see only ten minutes left on your shift. You lock your phone, and start cleaning up the shop. You'd probably run over by a few minutes, but it wasn't really a big deal. You didn't have anything else to do that night, anyway.

Anais helps you as she chatters away about anything and everything- her boyfriend, school, a game she was playing the other day- she just _talked._ Normally you'd try to interject more, but today you just let her run off on tangent after tangent, only replying when she asked for input. You were very absorbed in thoughts about Poppy, and therefore were only giving her half of your attention.

As crazy as the photos on the article made the incident sound, for some reason you could believe that he was involved- if only barely. You decided that it was probably his intimidating demeanor that made it so believable. He was relatively tall, and he rarely had any changes in his facial expression, which made him seem a little dead and ruthless. He definitely seemed the type to chase a guy down through crowded streets in a full-on shootout. Maybe. You decided you were probably overthinking it.

You waved at Anais as you two parted ways for the night, and immediately you were on the lookout for Poppy. Now that you’d seen him in town, you expected him to show up everywhere. As ridiculous as the notion was, you just couldn’t let it go. You didn’t know if you _wanted_ him to show up, or if you fervently hoped he didn’t. As you finished up your day and got into bed, you frequently found yourself trying to puzzle out what he was, but to no avail. You drifted off into sleep, your mind still consumed with thoughts of him and your strange encounters with him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i have a [tumblr](speedohiko.tumblr.com)
> 
> This chapter was so hard to write afndskjjsdkf;;; ~~I still haven't learned how to end them~~ I have more ideas for like. later. and not the beginning set up so i'm struggling but there are already so many of you _(301 hits and 12 kudos after a single chapter?? that is unheard of for me thank you all so much !! <3)_ I feel like it'll start picking up in the next few chapters and I'll try out some action which I'm not _great_ at if you were around in my fanfiction.net or Wattpad days. ~~if you were i'm so sorry~~


	3. tea rose

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> And now she has a name.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A tea rose is sometimes said to mean _I'll remember._

While you absolutely hated working, you hated having nothing to do, and this day off was looking to be one of the most uneventful days you’d had in a long while. You opened your phone’s contacts, scrolling through the bloated list, wondering if any of them might be available to visit that day. Most of the numbers were people from high school that you had barely talked to in the first place, and you realized just how badly you needed to go through and delete irrelevant contacts. You scrolled a bit fast, though, and ended up in the J’s. It got hard to breathe as soon as you read one of the names, a ghost from your past that you’d never really had the heart to delete.

Shaking your head, you went back to the early alphabet. The only name that stuck out in the A’s was Anais, who was working. You could go see her, but you didn’t really want to set foot into work if you didn’t have to. B’s actually only held people you didn’t talk to and one of your sisters, who lived in another state. Another letter down for the count. You stopped at the name Coriander, and nodded.

Coriander lived about thirty minutes away by public transit, and she seemed like a good option. You tapped her contact and hit call, hoping she’d be free. You didn’t really want to continue the “search the contacts for someone to socialize with” game.

“Hello?”

“Cori! It’s me,” you said, just happy that she picked up. “I have the day off today-  _ shocking, _ I know- and literally nothing else going on in my life, so I was wondering if you were free today? It’d be nice to see you- it’s been way too long.”

“Yeah, I’m free today, absolutely. You should take time off more often, you know?”

You laughed. “Probably, but I can’t stand not having anything to do, so I just work to fill the time, honestly,” you said as you pulled up the bus schedule on your laptop. “Uh, let’s see, when’s a good time to get over there? I still do not have a car, so I’m stuck with  _ public transit.” _

“Ugh, ew,” Coriander said jokingly. “Um, probably around one? The next bus is probably like, 12:15, right?”

“Yeah, so I’ll see you then?”

“See you then.”

You hung up, and then finished getting ready; you had about forty-five minutes before you needed to be at the bus stop, so you didn’t feel a real rush. A vague thought of Poppy inched into your mind, and you groaned, hoping to whatever God there might be out there that he would  _ not  _ come by to ruin your day. Not that he  _ really  _ ruined it, he was just a nuisance because you wanted answers and he just would not give them to you.

He didn’t have a real name to you, or a history, or a life- he just  _ existed.  _ He showed up one day out of nowhere and started this train of confusing feelings and it was making you insane. You didn’t even know  _ why  _ you wanted to solve this mystery of a man so badly, but it was consuming a good deal of your mental energy. You vaguely remembered reading about something in the human brain that they liked the pieces of things to fall together perfectly, and would continue thinking about something if it didn’t go that way. You decided that it was that theory keeping him on the forefront of your mind, and not for some other wild reason.

You hadn’t bothered to check the weather before leaving, but you could just tell that it was going to be a rather warm day based on the view from your apartment’s window. The sky was perfectly clear and the sun was almost perfectly in the center of the sky- typical for noon in the dwindling summer.

You checked your phone after boarding the bus, stalking your Facebook feed for any news of strange incidents around the city. There were none. Slightly disappointed, you looked out the window to your right and watched the lane lines blur as you drove, easing your mind slightly. You hadn’t really realized how much stress that the stranger with the metal arm had been putting on you until you forced yourself to  _ not  _ think about him so incessantly.

Your moment of peace was interrupted as the bus screeched to a hard stop, almost sending you flying forward. You looked out the window again, wondering what caused the sudden halt. It was just in time to see  _ Captain America  _ flying towards the bus at a high speed. He made contact before you had finished processing what had happened, causing the bus to swing back a fair amount before steadying again.

And that’s when you stood up and fled the bus.

You didn’t know  _ who  _ was fighting him, but if Captain America was involved, you wanted to stay as far away as you could. You almost get run into by a tall woman with ginger hair, who looked over at you for only a second before speaking.

“You! Go! Get out of the way! It’s not safe here!”

You didn’t know who she was specifically, but you could figure that she was with Captain America and was worth listening to. You turn to run, but a gunshot rings out and you spin back towards it.

The same woman was pressed up against a car, holding her shoulder, which seemed to be leaking a fair amount of blood. She must have been the one shot, but you couldn’t tell where the shooter was. Suddenly, Captain America sprang from god-knows-where and deflected a bullet off of his shield, and that’s when you saw him.

_ “Again?” _ your shock and annoyance was clear in your voice, and you groaned. You ran over to the same car as the mystery woman, ducking under it. “I can’t fucking  _ believe  _ this.”

“Weren’t you listening?” the woman snapped from beside you. “Get out of here! This man is ruthless and dangerous!”

“Oh,  _ trust me, _ ” you replied in a gruff tone. “I know. I have some words for him.”

“Are you insane? He’ll shoot you on the spot,” she said, taking a large gasp. “Just go, go home, forget about this. It’s better that way.”

“But I-”

_ “Go!” _

You duck behind cars as you’re running, in case he decides to take fire against  _ you,  _ an innocent pedestrian. You end up pausing behind a mailbox, breathing heavily. While you weren’t in terrible shape, you were not a marathon runner, either, and so you just couldn’t run anymore. In the event of a zombie apocalypse, you were probably fucked. You turn to watch the fight happening in the middle of the street.

Poppy’s metal arm was fully exposed today, and you could see a red star on the shoulder. You didn’t really know what the mark meant, but you could wager that it was a symbol of his employer. He wore a black mask that covered the lower half of his face, assumingly to mask his identity.  _ Whatever his identity actually was. _

After ducking to dodge Poppy’s knife, Captain stabbed the edge of his shield into the metal arm with a sickening _crunch,_ and you cringed a little. He slammed the shield into Poppy’s face, then threw him by the head a few feet away. The mask clattered to the ground as he rolled forward and stood up, then turned back to face Captain.

Recognition and shock were clear on Captain’s face, though you couldn’t really imagine why. And then finally, after three days of absolute confusion and frustration, you have a name- of a sort, anyway.

“Bucky?”

“Who the hell is Bucky?”

Poppy- or Bucky, rather- raised a gun, but was quickly kicked down by a man wearing some kind of mechanical wings. You decided to ditch the fight and start running again, though you don’t exactly know what you’re going to do. You figured that most buses would be shut down on the route you needed, but there was no way to be sure until you were a safe enough distance away to look at a schedule.

You run for what feels like thirteen miles, though it was probably no more than a dozen blocks, and you see another bus stop that seems to have people waiting at it. You slowed to walk, partially to let yourself regain your breath and partially to not alarm anyone. You pulled out your phone, which you were thankful was unharmed in the day’s events. Scrolling through your contacts, you stop at Coriander’s name.

“Hello?”

“Hi, Cori, it’s me again,” you said, still panting a little. “So, um, you’ll never believe me, but I just witnessed a guy get into a fight with Captain America, and he totally crashed my bus.”

“Are you  _ serious?” _

“Unfortunately. Also, this is the third time I’ve seen the guy. He has like, almost shoulder-length brown hair, and these like gorgeous blue eyes and a  _ metal fucking arm.” _

“Holy  _ shit,  _ a metal arm?” Coriander’s surprise was evident over the phone, similar to Anais’ reaction to the idea of someone with a metal prosthetic. “I think it’s funny that you mentioned his hair and eyes before you mention a  _ metal fucking arm.” _

“Anais said something similar,” you replied with a laugh. “I don’t know, it struck me as weird, but it’s actually not the first thing I noticed on him.”

“You have always kind of noticed faces before anything else, huh?” Coriander said, and you laughed again. “Yeah, seriously, it’s ridiculous. Like,  _ ‘oh my god, look at how buff that guy is’,  _ and you are always like  _ ‘oh shit, I just thought his face was hot, but his body is an added plus’. _ I’m pretty sure we’ve had that exact conversation before.”

“Um, probably. Anyway, yeah, so I called to tell you I’m gonna be a  _ tiny  _ bit later than originally anticipated, due to a metal-armed asshat who has been fucking up my days recently,” you told her as you got to the bus stop. “But I am still on the way.”

“All right, cool. See you in… what, twenty minutes?”

“At most, yeah,” you agreed. “Okay, see you then.”

“Bye!”

You hung up the phone, looking at the time. You were really only going to be about half an hour later than you had originally planned, which was good. That Bucky didn’t deserve to ruin your time with Coriander.

_ Bucky,  _ you thought, rolling the name around in your head. You’d waited long enough after meeting him to learn his name, and now you wouldn’t forget it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i have a [tumblr](speedohiko.tumblr.com)
> 
> I AM SO SORRY FOR THE WAIT LMAO. School got in the way and then i just didn't have a lot of motivation for it over the summer for various reasons, including but not limited to a family vacation in Orlando and an incredible deterioration of my mental health. but we're BACK and i'm gonna try to update at least twice a month!! (this isn't going to be super long, we only have about 6 chapters left, plus probably four oneshots)


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